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The Furry World from the Inside Out

Publishing Furry

In his recent article Of Rabbits and Rayguns, Phil Geusz described his fight to get the mainstream publishing industry to accept furry fiction. Phil is an accomplished writer, and he and I share a number of views and goals. He has chosen a different path than I have to attain those goals, but I think both paths are valid. In response, or perhaps complement, to his article, I’d like to offer my own thoughts.

I have for the past decade been becoming more and more familiar with the furry publishing industry. I have good friends at Sofawolf and FurPlanet and we talk business on a number of occasions. As a fairly high-profile author, I am always trying to figure out ways I can make our joint business more successful. At the same time, over the past two or three years, I have been talking with and listening to more people in the larger SF publishing world; mostly authors, but also some editors.

It’s probably instructive to define a couple things before we get into the state of the industry and its attitude toward the fandom. First, I want to draw a distinction between furry fiction and fiction with furries. Furry fiction, by my definition, is fiction in which the furries are the prominent, if not exclusive, characters, and in which their existence is accepted as a given. Fiction with furries is fiction in which furries are an explained part of the world, possibly protagonists, but not necessarily.

To give examples: my Out of Position books are furry fiction. Kevin Frane’s books are furry fiction. Watts Martin’s Ranea stories are furry fiction (but closer to the line). The San Iadras stories of foozzzball are fiction with furries (but again, close to the line). Most of Phil’s stories that I’m aware of would be in that same category, as would Cordwainer Smith’s Norstrilia and other underpeople stories, C.J. Cherryh’s Chanur books, Larry Niven’s Kzin books, Alan Dean Foster’s Spellsinger books, H. Beam Piper’s Fuzzy books and John Scalzi’s recent reboot…Fred Patten could probably add another hundred names to that list. Jonathan Lethem’s Gun, With Occasional Music is also fiction with furries, but much further from the dividing line: the kangaroo is a secondary character, and while his existence is never really explained, he’s also not that important to the story.

The reason to draw this distinction is that we in the furry fandom are used to furries. We are so used to them that now, stories that include the Origin Of Furries as a major part are very rare. We know all the origins: space aliens, created by humans (for war or sex, usually), or humans changed by magic or a virus (sometimes a magical virus). That is no longer as important to us as what the author does with the characters.

Non-furries, by contrast, often need the origin story, and so there is a gap between what is publishable in the furry fandom and what is publishable in the larger F/SF world (there is also a gap because of the general quality of furry fiction and the barriers to publication, and that gap is actually larger than the gap attributable to world-building, but that’s another post). And that leads me to the second thing I want to define.

The publishing industry is a business. It is a tricky business, because they are taking creative properties which people have a personal investment in and attempting to gauge how many other people will relate to those properties enough to spend money on them. Publishers tend to the conservative, because if they take too many gambles, and nobody buys the books they publish, they won’t be publishing for very long.

In general, publishers lump book submissions into four categories: (1) This is awesome and everyone will buy it; (2) This is pretty good and we know we can sell it; (3) This is good but we don’t think we can sell it; (4) No.

(It will not surprise you to learn that the vast, vast majority of submissions fall into category 4.)

Right now, there is no established market for furry fiction, not in the F/SF mainstream, not in the way that there is for space opera or Tolkienesque fantasies or wizard school stories. I’ll come back to this in a moment, but what that means is that a furry book, or even a “fiction with furries” that is close to the line, pretty much has to fall into that first category to get serious consideration from a mainstream publisher. And I don’t think that book has been written yet.

(By contrast, you will see from the above examples that there is plenty of “fiction with furries” in the mainstream market, and has been for decades. There’s no publisher I know of that would reject a book they otherwise would have bought just because some characters in it are furries.)

But the good news is that there’s another way to convince publishers that furry fiction is a winning proposition, and that’s by showing them. This is what Phil is doing with his books; this is what short story sales to F/SF venues (Renee Carter Hall and Mary Lowd have both had that success this year) do; this is what strong sales by furry publishers do.

Here’s where some of the burden falls on the fandom. The furry fandom is still small by comparison to worldwide SF fandom. In the fandoms’ respective awards, the Ursa Majors, which are free to all, do not get as many votes as SF fandom’s Hugos, which require a minimum of $50 to vote. Furry fandom is, I think, more active, more vibrant, and more creative—but furries just do not read as much as science fiction fans, whose fandom is centered around books.

Fantasy and science fiction books regularly make the New York Times bestseller lists; the industry supports thousands of midlist authors who sell thousands of books. I have friends in the fandom who buy hundreds—plural—of books a year. In many ways, furry fandom is stronger than SF fandom; books, for the moment, are not one of those ways.

And this brings me back to the statement about there being no established market for furry fiction. There is, clearly, a market. Sofawolf and FurPlanet and Rabbit Valley manage to not only survive, but prosper, selling furry books, but they operate on a smaller scale than Tor, Daw, Baen, etc. The good news is that that market is growing. Phil has found success outside the fandom with his David Birkenhead series. I’ve found success outside the fandom with my Out of Position books. With every sale outside the fandom, we are showing people that they can enjoy stories with furry characters, and opening opportunities for more furry books.

It’s a slow process, but that’s the way these things happen. Are we ever going to convince everyone in the world that they should like furries? No. I occasionally see the same comments Phil talked about, from people who just have to tell the world how much they don’t get furries, and you know what? That’s fine. There are people who hate vampires, people who hate boy wizards, people who hate science fiction. In fact, I think the appearance of these protestors is actually a good sign. The fact that they feel the need to loudly state their objection means that they feel like they’re in the minority. They look around and see other people appreciating these stories, and they don’t get it, and because they don’t feel like part of the “in” crowd, they have to justify their stance.

But I think it’s a mistake to assume that mainstream F/SF publishers feel that way, simply because they say “we don’t publish talking animal stories.” I had a conversation with an editor from a mainstream F/SF publisher in which she said, “Why does there have to be a distinction between furry fiction and ‘mainstream’ fiction? Why can’t it just be about good stories?” Amen. Remember, publishers are a business. If they find a story with furries that they just can’t ignore, they will publish it.

Furry fandom is growing, and the market for furry books is growing. I’ve mentioned this before, but I think this past year was the first time all five Ursa Major Novel candidates were written by furries. I remember a time when you could walk through a furry con’s dealer’s room without seeing a single novel; now you can choose from probably about fifty of them.

Are they selling at a mainstream F/SF level? Not yet. But readership within the fandom is growing, and the fandom itself is growing. I’m pretty happy selling my books to the people who are passionate about them. The people who don’t want to read them don’t have to. I’m just glad that there is a big, growing community of people who do.

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About Kyell

Kyell is a fox, a writer, and a California resident. He likes to write stories of varying lengths, often (but not always) dealing with gay relationships and foxes. You can find information about his stories on his website, and read his blog at http://www.kyellgold.com/wpblog for thoughts on furry fandom, writing, gay rights, and eagles, and for information on his upcoming books.
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I certainly hope furry becomes more acceptable to mainstream publishers, but would be concerned then that they might push out the furry publishing industry,

I would add two categories to the origins of furries: 1)”the normal result of natural evolution” to your list of origins even if I cannot think of a book that specifically states it. I certainly don’t know what you had in your mind for Volle, but it doesn’t seem to fit the other categories you outlined; 2) a variation on your manmade for war/sex, I would add “slave labor.” I’ve actually seen that more then “for sex” but then maybe I am reading the wrong books.

I did get 31 books for Christmas this year, but most were not furry. I would say in my case that is due to furry not being mainstream and to the furry publishers having prominent adult fiction. I am not opposed to good adult furry fiction, but I am less comfortable directing my family to web sites where it is a prominent element.

I realize I am going off on a tangent, but I have nothing to add to your main point and was interested in how you would classify writing in which the characters are non-human animals that are behaviorly but not physically anthropomorphic, e.g., Wind in the Willows, Beatrix Potter’s tales, perhaps Watership Down.

They still qualify as anthropomorphic. In a lot of ways they are easier for people to relate to, because we anthropomorphize non-human animals all the time. Watership Down definitely qualifies and is in fact one of the examples I use often.

Just curious, did you consciously choose to use the term “anthropomorphic” as opposed to “furry” as a way of distinguishing them from fiction with physically anthropomorphic characters, or were you just using them as synonyms?

In other words, would you see furry fiction as a subcategory of anthropomorphic fiction in which characters are physically anthropomorphic?

Technically it is a subcategory of anthropomorphic fiction, but in reality it’s probably the vast majority. I use the words as synonyms, though when I’m writing something professional, I use “anthropomorphic” rather than the more colloquial and casual “furry.”

Kyell, as always you’re a true gentleman and a scholar. I suspect we’re in about 95% agreement on most issues regarding furry literature/publishing, and so far as I’m concerned the other 5% just adds spice to life.

I must say, however, that the rejection slips I received for so many years specifying “we don’t buy talking animal stories” were in fact very real. I beat my head up against them for I don’t know how long, so hard that I doubt I’ll ever really get over the experience or find much forgiveness in my heart. The Amazon commentators who absolutely freaked out over my choice of an anthro rabbit as a viewpoint character are very real as well– indeed, I’ve added considerably to my collection of such comments since the original article was posted. (For those who didn’t read my original post, I’ll point out again that I’m very pleased to say that most comments there were positive and supportive; it was the unusually powerful emotions of the relatively few negative posts regarding the anthropomorphic content of the stories that were the basis of my article. Please, see my original posting for more details.) I still maintain that there’s something to be learned about human nature there. And yes, I very much understand that publishing is a business. So is being an author! My point, however, is that a lot of folks in the publishing industry seem (or then seemed) to think publishing anthropomorphic fiction is _bad_ business. While they might not’ve said so to your face, they or their colleagues certainly put it bluntly in my rejection slips. At least half a dozen of them, and I have to wonder how many others it was an unspoken factor in?

I agree with you that in a sense the negative comments are a Good Thing– I hope they’re draining down the pool of negative emotion which I believe _does_ exist among a small but intensely-feeling minority of the general public. As stated in the article, my intent was _not_ to complain about this. Rather, I’d like to learn from it, as I suspect there’s a major lesson about human nature and how we react to symbols buried in there somewhere. For me, this sort of thing is good novel-material if I can but wrap my head around it.

All that said… One of the things about the furry literary community that’s pleased me most throughout my years of involvement is that as a group we seem to understand that what’s good for one is good for us all. I’ve been an exponent of this since Day One. Kyell Gold’s successes are my successes are Furplanet’s successes are Legion Publishing’s successes. We’re all lifting each other out of obscurity. I was thrilled when Sofawolf won its Hugo, and quite frankly on bad days it’s one of the things that inspires me to push on.

And I _do_ push and push and push and push, of course. As hard as I can, to get just one more short story or novel on the market before I breathe my last. This is my essential, nastily stubborn nature. (“Here I am, Lord Frith, cranking out yet more second-rate pay copy in the tall grass!”) But I _do_ think we’re pushing against a literary/stylistic/cultural headwind– it’s hit me too hard too many times for me to ignore. Which just makes our successes sweeter still.

Absolutely! Any author who has a history of making his publisher a tidy profit has far better odd of having _anything_ accepted than a newbie. Though from what I hear, however, it’s growing difficult even for them to sell manuscripts. This is not a Happy Time for the publishing industry as a whole.

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[adjective][species] is a blog that takes a look at the furry fandom from the inside. The writings here come from a wide variety of furry authors, and cover any and all meta-furry topics that we can get our paws on.